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James Bidgood’s seminal film, “Pink Narcissus,” is on display at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris

James Bidgood’s groundbreaking film, “Pink Narcissus,” is included in “Masculine / Masculine. The Nude Man in Art from 1800 to the Present Day” at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, September 24, 2013 – January 2, 2014:

While it has been quite natural for the female nude to be regularly exhibited, the male nude has not been accorded the same treatment. It is highly significant that until the show at the Leopold Museum in Vienna in the autumn of 2012, no exhibition had opted to take a fresh approach, over a long historical perspective, to the representation of the male nude. However, male nudity was for a long time, from the 17th to 19th centuries, the basis of traditional Academic art training and a key element in Western creative art.

Therefore when presenting the exhibition “Masculine / Masculine,” the Musée d’Orsay, drawing on the wealth of its own collections and of other French public collections, aims to take an interpretive, playful, sociological and philosophical approach to exploring all aspects and meanings of the male nude in art. Given that the 19th century took its inspiration from 18th century classical art, and that this influence still resonates today, the Musée d’Orsay is extending its traditional historical range in order to draw a continuous arc of creation through two centuries down to the present day, and will include the whole range of techniques: painting, sculpture, graphic arts and, of course, photography, which will have an equal place in the exhibition.